A Surat-based managing trustee has secured a legal victory in the United States after a court rejected Gregory Black’s claim to 30 acres of land owned by the Gandhi family trust.
BY PC Bureau
October 30: A 20-month legal battle over 30 acres of land in Virginia, owned by a charitable trust established by Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson and his wife, has ended with a US court ruling in favour of the trust. The court has ordered a local resident who claimed ownership under Virginia’s adverse possession law to vacate the property, remove all structures and belongings, and surrender possession.
The property, adjoining Shenandoah National Park in Warren County, Virginia, was purchased in 1987 by Kanu Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson, and his wife, Shiva Gandhi. The couple later returned to India and spent their final years in South Gujarat, where they established a charitable trust and transferred their assets to it.
Parimal Desai, a Surat-based lawyer and managing trustee of the trust, told The Times of India that the dispute began on January 10, 2025, when US resident Gregory Black sent a legal notice to his residence, claiming ownership of the property under Virginia’s adverse possession law.
The law allows a person to acquire ownership of land after 15 years of continuous possession, provided five specific legal conditions are satisfied. Black, however, failed to establish exclusive and actual possession or demonstrate the required hostile claim to the property.
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Kanu and Shiva Gandhi returned to India in 2013. Kanu died in Surat in November 2016, leaving his assets to his wife under his will. In 2018, Shiva established the Dr. Shiva and Kanu Ramdas Mohandas Gandhi Charitable Trust and registered her will. Following her death in 2020, the will was executed and Desai took charge as managing trustee.
The trust inherited the couple’s properties and financial assets, with a mandate to promote Gandhian philosophy through charitable activities.
Desai first visited the Virginia property in 2024 and commissioned a survey costing $4,500. “If the trust wanted to do anything with the land, it had to be in its possession,” he said. He subsequently had Shiva Gandhi’s will probated in a US court in 2025 and secured the property title in the trust’s name.
Black maintained that he had occupied the land since 2008. His claim relied on photographs and references to trails, a cabin, tree stands, a culvert and other improvements allegedly made on the property.
Desai engaged American lawyers and coordinated the trust’s legal defence from India, using artificial intelligence tools to help organise material and prepare the case. During the final four-day trial, held from September 8 to 11, he also placed before the court details of the Gandhi family’s lineage and the charitable objectives of the trust.
Evidence presented during the proceedings undermined Black’s claims. Geographic Information System (GIS) mapping established that the cabin had not existed on the property for the required 15 years. Desai’s multiple visits to the land since 2020 also weakened the assertion that Black had exercised continuous possession. Further, evidence that another woman was living on the property contradicted Black’s claim of exclusive occupation.
In an order dated October 21, Judge Daryl L. Funk of the Warren County Circuit Court ruled in favour of Desai and the charitable trust.
The court directed Black to pay $11,375 towards the fees of the Guardian ad Litem appointed to represent unknown heirs. It also ordered him to remove the cabin, hunting stands, hunting huts and all personal belongings from the property within 30 days, at his own expense.
Black has additionally been directed to surrender possession of the land and refrain from entering the property or exercising any ownership rights over it.
The ruling brings to an end a prolonged dispute over property acquired by the Gandhi couple nearly four decades ago and now held by a trust dedicated to preserving and propagating their legacy.
